The Offering
by Cersia2
Summary: Loki offers Jane Foster a taste of immortality. Warning: Major Character Death.


Loki promised to pay her a visit. That was the only reason he was here. To show the whole of creation that he was good at keeping his word. She was alone in this room, reclined on a bed covered with white linen and a thin coverlet. There were no furs to keep the chill away. She was surrounded by Midgardian medical technology. With a blink of his eye, he silenced the content sound it made which kept time with her heartbeat.

"Is this where your strength lies now, Jane Foster? In these machines, that keep your life thread from being sheared away? Does This still believe that your old and wrinkled vessel warrants his attention? I think not. I can see your memories. It's been over 20 years since he last paid you a visit. I did warn you. Do you not remember? Here let me help you remember."

Loki crossed the room in a blur of motion. He noted that her hair had gone white, and where it had been thick in her youth, age was thinning it out. He pressed his lips against Jane's forehead.

 _Jane had pressed forward and was in Loki's company, yet Thor remained in Sif's going over the plan._

 _"Fair Jane, why do you do this to yourself?"_

 _"Do what?"_

 _Loki allowed a devious grin to appear. "Why torment yourself with Thor's company when you know you will grow old without him, and he shall find another to shower his affections upon."_

 _Jane smirked knowingly. She could give as good as she could get. "Because I can."_

 _Oh yes, she watched with glee as Thor's destructive younger brother squirmed. In fact, his face lost that smirk altogether. Was he pouting? Or…wait a second. "You're jealous, aren't you?"_

 _She never heard him answer because Thor had finished with his conversation with Sif and now they were on their way._

Loki pulled out of Jane's memory and laughed loudly at what he had seen. "Prideful to the end, are you my dear, Jane."

He wasn't sure if Jane could hear him. But it didn't matter did it? "I will tell you that honestly, at that moment, yes, I was jealous. Because there, in your veins, pulsed the power to destroy the universe, and I didn't possess it so that I could make my father and brother kneel before me and _beg_ me not to unleash it. You had that power, Jane. And yes, I was absurdly jealous of you and Thor at that moment. Had you been mine, I would have wielded you like a weapon until you turned into dust from possessing such a flame within your body."

Loki watched as Jane's eyes slipped open then. She seemed to recognize him. "Yes, Jane, I have come to pay you a visit." Loki noticed the great effort it took Jane to begin to lift her hand. She wanted to touch him. Grabbing her hand Loki, placed it upon his face. "Yes, Jane. I am flesh. And unlike you my dear mortal, I barely aged since we last met a heartbeat ago."

Her flesh was cold, and her hand shook tremendously. He helped her steady it as it roamed over his face as if she were…. "Blind are we, Jane?" he asked.

"I am a dubious thing, but I can be charitable." With a wave of his hand, her eyes were no longer sightless. In fact, he made it so that she could breathe without the aid of a machine and gave most of her hearing back to her.

"How long can you stay?" she asked, apparently finally able to speak.

"Till the end of the day, which only lasts a half an hour more.

"I thought I was forgotten."

"No, my dearest Jane, you have not been forgotten. The moment you brought Thor to his knees and made him fit to rule Asgard, I knew I would never forget you." There was a tenderness in his voice that he didn't know existed.

"You killed…"

"I did indeed. But I didn't kill you, Jane, for you deserved to see every horror you ever wrought onto this realm and others. Every soldier that made it through your Bifrost to the nine realms, every death they encountered, every death they caused was your fault, only because you didn't know when to stop. How did you ever sleep at night?"

"I didn't…"

"Oh but you did. You opened the way. So we are equals, in a sense, that is. You see, I can make you young again. I can give you Asgard's version of immortality. What do you say, Jane? All you have to do is bite into this apple, and you will be renewed, and you can join me in Asgard."

With a flash of light, he was gone and everything that had been before his arrival.

Soon after, an alarm went off. "Cold Blue in room 3."

"That's Dr. Foster's room isn't it?" A nurse said rushing down the corridor.

"Yeah, the scientist who invented the network of wormholes."

The two women pushed open the doors and found the old woman dead on her bed her hand outstretched towards an apple on the floor. It looked as though she had tried to take a bite out of it.

The young nurse rushed over to the bed and checked the old woman for a pulse. "Better call SHIELD, Miranda, she's gone."

Miranda picked up the apple and examined it. "Who brought this in for her?! Everyone knows that Dr. Foster is allergic to apples."


End file.
